As could be predicted from Netflix‘s recent confirmation of commitment to the use of 4KHD in their streaming process, their leading original show is set to be one of the first pieces of new content receive the treatment.

It has been confirmed by Netflix this week that season 2 of hit award-winning (and nominated) political drama House of Cards is set to be available with a 4K streaming option on Netflix once premiered next year, making the Kevin Spacey-led series the first on the subscription streaming website to carry ‘Ultra HD’, though its availability will currently be limited to ‘select next-generation smart TV sets’, some of which will be revealed at next month’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES 2014) in Las Vegas (USA) as products designed to be compatible with Netflix’s .

Speaking to Stuff, Netflix’s ‘chief product officer’ Neil Hunt stated: “We’re not naming specific manufacturers but we have several of the major TV vendors who are going to be producing 4K-capable TVs – they’ll be announcing them at CES. The new game consoles may eventually be 4K-capable, but the ability to take 4K out of the box and drop it into a separate television is lacking some standards and HDMI 2.0, and it’s just a little premature. So we probably will see that, but right now we’re talking about 4K Netflix built into the smart TV.”

We’re pushing forward with new encoding technology [which will assist in bringing Netflix in 4K to other platforms]. We’ll be using H.265, which is colloquially known as HEVC, instead of AVC H.264. We think with that we’re going to be delivering in the 10-16Mbps range – about 15Mbps is probably what we should think of.”

The developments are claimed by Netflix to mean that tablet computers smartphones, desktop products and games consoles are all in line for 4K upgrades to their Netflix apps in future through the technology, which will offer a high resolution stream with reduced possibility of lag. For now, though, a leading achievement will be to have 4KHD present in the first place as one of the first content providers (online or off) to offer it, with the premiere of House of Cards season 2 arriving in a single burst on 14 February 2014.

A trailer and your first chance to fall in love with that 13-episode run can be seen below: